Congressional Notifications

6/03/2010

Dear Congressional Staff:

The U.S. Department of Labor will host two town hall meetings on June 29, 2010 in Livermore, California and June 30, 2010 in Emeryville, California, to provide information about the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act. Department officials will present details about a new class of former employees at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory recently added to the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act's (EEOICPA) Special Exposure Cohort (SEC), as well as to provide an overview of the program. The department's staff will be available at the town hall meetings for extended periods of time to help individuals interested in filing claims under the EEOICPA.

The EEOICPA provides compensation and medical benefits to employees who became ill as a result of working in the nuclear weapons industry. An employee who is included in a designated special exposure cohort group or class of employees, and who is diagnosed with one of 22 specified cancers, may receive a presumption of causation under the EEOICPA. The new SEC class of former employees includes all employees of the Department of Energy, its predecessor agencies, and its contractors and subcontractors who worked at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, California, from January 1, 1950 through December 31, 1973, and at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in Berkeley, CA, from August 13, 1942 through December 31, 1961, for at least 250 work days occurring either solely under this employment or in combination with workdays within other classes of employees in the SEC.

The town hall meetings are going to be held on June 29, 2010, at 2:00 p.m. at the Doubletree Livermore, 720 Las Flores Road, Livermore, California, and June 30, 2010, at 2:00 p.m. and 7:00 p.m., at the Woodfin Suites Hotels, 5800 Shellmound Street, Emeryville, California. The extended resource center hours for both locations will be from 12:00 p.m. until 5:00 p.m.